


That One Man, Scorned and Covered with Scars

by Muccamukk



Series: Sex and Identity [3]
Category: Avengers (Comics), Captain America (Comics), Iron Man (Comic), Marvel 616
Genre: Angst, M/M, Missing Scene, Plot What Plot, five things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-04-07
Updated: 2009-04-07
Packaged: 2017-10-03 00:41:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muccamukk/pseuds/Muccamukk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or, Four Times Steve Saw Tony's Scars and Had Sex with Him Anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	That One Man, Scorned and Covered with Scars

**Author's Note:**

> Title lifted from "The Impossible Dream" from _Man of La Mancha_. Thank you to the ever patient Culurien for the speedy beta.

Desktop (or, Steve and Tony's First Time, which Doesn't Really Go Like Steve Planned. Steve's POV)

* * *

  
After he got his new heart, and could finally, _finally_, survive without that awful chest plate, Tony felt like flying.

Well, not really, he really felt incredibly shaky from the surgery, on top of all the strain he'd heaped on himself over the past week. But he was a human being again, with a beating heart, not some freak doomed to live inside a tin can for the rest of his life.

Steve hadn't wanted to do anything so strenuous right after he got out of the hospital. Tony had cleverly overcome Captain America's better nature, however, and now here he was.

He turned his head to the side and moaned into the pillow as Steve pushed back into him. Steve was taking things painfully slow, kneeling between Tony's spread legs. Steve had braced himself so that they only touched where he entered Tony and where he pressed his lips to Tony's temple.

If Tony opened his eyes, he knew that he would see Steve looking down at him, studying his every expression and reaction. He didn't think he could stand to see the concern in those serious blue eyes right now though. The man loved him, and Tony had lied to him in so many ways.

He tried to push up into Steve's thrusts, to make him go faster, but he had no real leverage at this angle. Steve just froze and waited for him to relax back onto the truly excessive pile of pillows he'd set up for them. "Easy, Tony," Steve whispered, lips brushing his ear. "We have all the time in the world." He shifted his weight, balancing on a single sculpted arm so that he could caress Tony's face and hair.

Tony kissed and sucked at Steve's fingers as they passed his mouth, leaning into the touch. He realised then that he could have more contact -- he could have whatever he wanted now -- and he took Steve's hand in his own. When he had undone buttons on his shirt, fingers fumbling and shaking -- Steve still hadn't slowed or changed his pace -- he guided Steve's hand to his belly.

He shuddered at the contact, at Steve caressing skin that no one but clinical medical staff had touched in years. Slowly, Tony pulled their hands over his abdomen, pushing his undershirt aside as he went.

Steve's hand stopped as it touched Tony's sternum, and he stilled his hips, hovering over Tony with just the tip of his cock inside him. "Are... are you sure?" he asked.

Tony silently cursed himself for all the times he'd pushed Steve's hands away, or had squirmed, pulled back, and outright protested. He'd made Steve so careful around him, trained him like a dog really, with calculated shows of affection and withdrawals. All to preserve his damned secret. He knew he should stop this, but he couldn't now. He _needed_ the touch.

He turned his head away from the pillow, meeting Steve's clear blue eyes, and said, "I'm sure."

Steve nodded and, with the same smooth motion, sunk all the way back into Tony and pulled his shirts up and off of him.

As the fabric passed over his head, Tony watched Steve's face intently. He knew what he looked like, with a mass of torn and twisted tissue spreading out from the centre of his chest. The marks of the latest surgery stood out as red lines on top of layers of hard white skin.

But Steve's eyes didn't leave Tony's, and he didn't blanch, or turn away, or, God help him, look at Tony with pity in his expression. He let Tony pull him down so their bare chests touched.

The feel of so much warm skin against Tony's lit his nerves on fire, and he came with a gasp on Steve's next thrust.

Steve followed a moment later, burying his face against Tony's neck.

As they lay together in the lazy afterglow, Steve trailed the tips of his fingers over Tony's torso, touch so light that Tony barely felt it.

When he leaned over to press a kiss on the damaged skin above Tony's new heart, and murmured, "You didn't have to hide this from me," Tony almost told him the truth.

* * *

  
Love in the Third Person (or, Iron Man Wants to Talk to Cap about Tony. Steve Is Confused. Steve's POV).

* * *

  
After they'd arrested Molecule Man, arranged for SHIELD to secure his castle and made it back to the Mansion, Tony shut himself in his lab. He didn't bother locking the door because he didn't want the bother of putting a new one in. Captain America had not looked like a happy man on the ride home.

Steve took longer than Tony thought he would to make it down. He'd obviously taken the time to compose himself, but Tony could almost see the waves of anger radiating off of him. He locked the door, stepped over the smouldering remains of the "Iron Leisure Suit" and grabbed Tony's shoulders hard enough to bruise them. Tony didn't try to resist as Steve picked him right off the floor and sat him down on one of his workbenches.

"Don't move," Steve growled, and stepped back.

He looked Tony over slowly, inspecting him as though he hadn't seen his body a hundred times before. Tony felt his cheeks heat in an uncharacteristic blush, and gripped the edge of the bench to keep from covering his crotch with his hands. He felt acutely aware of the cold metal under his thighs, and that he only had a red thong between himself and complete exposure.

Steve had yet to take off even his gloves or cowl.

Tony really wanted to hide, to run away, but he knew he had to face this like a man. He'd known that he would have to from day one, no matter how much he tried to avoid it, so he straightened his back and looked at Steve's face. He saw the anger he'd expected in the line of his brows under the mask and the tightness of his jaw. Something else blazed in his eyes though; something that made Tony flush again, and not with embarrassment.

Steve's examination paused at Tony's thong, and his lips quirked as he saw it starting to bulge out. He didn't say anything, but unhurriedly took off his boots, then belt and pants; he wasn't wearing anything underneath. He didn't touch the top half of his uniform, but stepped forward, cock hardening.

Over the years, Tony had imagined a number of ways in which Steve would react when he found out what Tony was. This had not been one of them. Tony swallowed, then winced as the back of the thong started to dig into his ass. He let Steve push him back onto the bench, and started to lift his legs. This was probably going to hurt, but he wouldn't protest if it made Steve stay... hell, even if this was the last time. He would let Steve take what he needed.

"I told you not to move," Steve said, and Tony made himself relax. Steve hooked his fingers under the sides of the thong and drew it down Tony's legs. Tony felt his cock spring up, and cried out in pain and arousal as Steve's smooth, gloved hand wrapped around it. Steve tightened his grip and pulled up steadily.

All the blood in Tony's body seemed to rush to one point under the base of Steve's thumb. For a moment, Tony thought he'd come right then and there.

Steve let him go, and he whimpered as the chilly air of the lab touched his skin again. The shiver spread and travelled up his body, rattling his teeth. God, Steve had barely touched him so far, and already he felt broken. "Please," he whispered.

Next thing he knew, Steve had climbed up on the table above him. He only had a moment to register the position Steve was taking, and that it wasn't at all what he was expecting. Then Steve stroked his cock again, this time rolling a condom over it, and sank down onto him. The ease of his entry made him realise why Steve had taken so long to make it to the lab, but then all rational thought vanished.

Tony keened and tried to grab Steve's hips, but Steve caught his hands, twining his fingers with Tony's, and holding them tight. He felt his vision blur as Steve sank down, and his feet twitched and slapped at the edge of the bench.

"Tony," Steve said sharply, "Tony! Breathe!"

Gasping, Tony tried to relax again, but all he could see was Captain America over him: red, white and blue and larger than life. His eyes fixed on the white star in the middle of Steve's chest, focusing on the stitching around it as he struggled for some kind of control.

He'd barely caught his breath when Steve lifted up off him, seemingly just by flexing his thighs. Someday, Tony was going to commission an epic about those thighs. Tony lifted his head to look down at where they joined. Cap's cock jutted out from under the edge of his shirt, purple and painfully hard. Tony could see about three inches of his own dick before it disappeared behind Steve's balls.

Tony wanted Steve to settle back onto him, but Steve didn't move. He waited, holding perfectly still, until Tony's eyes made it back to his face. He said then, "If this is going to work, I need to know everything." He didn't sound angry, his tone soft and even, but Tony knew from the clipped edges of his words that he was absolutely serious.

Only Tony knew he couldn't make that promise. He wouldn't lie to Steve when they were together like this, and he knew himself well enough to know that he couldn't, or wouldn't, hold to that forever. "Steve..." he started, eyes wide and pleading.

"Everything, Tony," Steve said. He let go of Tony's hand and touched his chest, red leather obscenely bright against the pale, scarred skin. "Where did you get this?" Steve asked.

That, at least, Tony could answer. "Stark Industries landmine, hit it while I was in... Oh, sweet Jesus!" Steve had started to sink down again, slowly, god, that man's muscles, and Tony had to grip Steve's hand tightly with both of his to keep from screaming. "Got it... got it patched up in some filthy cave. I was a mess, had to wear the Iron Man chest plate... all the... Christ... all the time to keep my heart beating."

"And this one?" Steve asked, tracing a line down the right side of his rib cage. Tony had to wonder how he could sound so calm. Steve had pulled away again, and Tony realised the game, the control he had to give up.

"That fight with Titanium Man, a few years back, breached the side of my armour, would have ki... killed me, except Happy was there." He let his words pour out now, hoping to encourage Steve to move faster.

He didn't. He just trailed his fingers over to anther patch of skin, another scar.

"That one actually _was_ a car crash," Tony said defensively. "And that was that time the Mandarin had me." He tried to buck up to increase the contact, but Steve just lifted away, so Tony kept talking. "He couldn't figure out how to open the armour, so he overloaded the coolant systems, tried to cook me out, burned a couple places pretty bad. Steve! Okay... okay: Lab accident, and, and... I don't remember; Hawkeye being an idiot? More shrapnel there. Bullet graze, that gold armour sucked."

Steve's hand moved up from his hip over his flank to slide under his back. Tony closed his eyes and shook his head. He wasn't going there. He couldn't. He moaned as the pressure on his cock shifted, but didn't realise that Steve had leaned forward until their lips met.

Steve made the kiss stunningly gentle, tracing his tongue along Tony's lower lip until he opened his mouth. Moving slowly here too, he lightly sucked at Tony's mouth and explored with his tongue. Tony shivered again as the metal scales of Steve's costume brushed his nipples. The contact lasted minutes, time in which Steve didn't move _at all_. When he finally drew away, he said, "Tony, please."

Tony sighed. It wasn't like Steve could think much less of him. "In the cave, they wanted me to build them weapons. When I wouldn't, they stopped asking nicely. So I made Iron Man and blew them all to hell."

He kept his eyes closed as Steve let go of his hands and straightened up. He braced on Tony's hipbones, holding him flat on the bench as he rode him. Now Steve rose and fell more quickly, gasping, thighs trembling against Tony's from the effort.

Hands free now, Tony reached under Steve's shirt and did his best to jerk him off. The angle wasn't great though, and his concentration was shot to hell.

Steve threw his head back and moaned in approval anyway. He came right before Tony did, splattering across his chest.

Tony expected Steve to pull off him and leave, but he stayed, panting, for a moment before gently disengaging. "Let's get you cleaned up," he said. "Then we can crash on your cot down here." He pulled his gloves off before offering Tony a hand up.

Tony stared up at him, not sure what was going on. "I can't tell you everything, Steve," he said. He wasn't sure how clear he'd made that, under the circumstances. Maybe Steve hadn't understood.

Steve pulled Tony to his feet and slid an arm around his waist. "I know," he said, "and I'm still mad at you, but you can't make me leave."

Tony wasn't so sure about that, but he let Steve lead him across the lab anyway.

* * *

  
After his armour gained sentience and spent a week torturing him before killing itself by implanting its heart in his chest, Tony found that he couldn't sleep though the night.

The third time he woke up screaming on his first night out of the hospital, he gave up. He could still feel those cold metal hands tearing at his flesh, snapping his bones. The voice that he'd created echoed in his ears, and he couldn't seem to make it go away.

He hadn't wanted a drink this badly in years, but he remembered the nightmare that thing had created for him. He knew what would happen. He'd made them all turn their backs on him last time, and he couldn't do that again. He knew he wouldn't survive alone this time.

Tony slid out of bed, and padded out of his room and down the hall, not bothering to put on more than his boxers and t-shirt. Pretty much all of the Avengers had seen him in less by now anyway.

He didn't knock, but Steve stirred when he opened the door, blinking sleepily up at him. "Is something wrong?" he asked blearily.

Tony hesitated in the doorway; maybe this was a stupid idea. "No... I just..."

"Hey," Steve said. "Come here." He rolled over to make room, and raised the blankets invitingly.

Tony crawled into the warm bed, and inhaled the familiar smells as deeply as he could. God, he'd missed this man.

As he lowered the covers, Steve looped an arm over Tony's shoulders and pulled him close. Tony settled his head on Steve's shoulder, and Steve stroked his back, hand moving in lazy circles.

Tony knew that Steve must feel the press of his mechanical heart through their shirts, but Steve didn't say anything. "Thanks," Tony murmured before exhaustion finally claimed him.

When he woke around mid-morning the next day, a Sunday, praise the lord, he felt Steve spooned behind him. One of Steve's hands was down his boxers, lightly squeezing his balls; the other was caressing his chest under his t-shirt.

Tony flinched as he lost track of the touch when it crossed over his new heart. "Steve," he said, "Don't."

"It's nothing I haven't seen, Tony, and I don't care," Steve said, but he withdrew both hands, joining them around his waist and drawing the two of them together. Tony could feel Steve's erection pressing against his ass, and realised that Steve was naked.

It was true. The Avengers had been the ones that pulled him off that island, after he'd dug up the armour and used its components to jury rig a distress call. Tony had seen Steve's face go white, then flush with anger when he'd realised what that thing had done. Cap had been a hair's breadth away from beating the ever-living shit out of some random palm tree just out of pure helpless rage.

"I know," Tony told him, "but I need to keep my shirt on for a while, okay?" He didn't want to remind Steve of what he'd let happen. He pulled away enough to wiggle around to face Steve, and kissed him. Even super soldiers had morning mouth, but Tony ignored that, and focused on the feel of their lips and the play of their tongues. "Roll over," Tony said when he pulled away.

Steve obeyed, flipping onto his belly and spreading his legs. He passed Tony the lube and condoms from his nightstand before he even asked for them.

Tony took his time opening Steve up, enjoying his little moans and the way he flexed his ass around Tony's fingers. If he pushed in just right, Tony could make Steve make a very unheroic squeak, which only got louder and needier on repetition. Steve pushed his ass up and wiggled it, but Tony still wouldn't rush.

Finally, when he couldn't stand to wait a second more, he slid on the condom and pushed into Steve. He pressed kisses into the back of Steve's neck and across his broad shoulders as he moved in and out.

Steve said something, but it was lost in the pillow. Tony got the intent though, and reached under them to take Steve's cock in his hand. Steve's hands clenched the covers until his knuckles went white.

When he came, Tony forgot, for a moment, the mechanical whirr that had replaced his heartbeat.

* * *

  
After Tony injected himself with the Extremis and upgraded into his own special kind of cyborg, the first thing he wanted to do, after beating up the bad guy, was show Steve.

Steve didn't react like Tony had hoped he would. Instead he looked mournfully at him and asked, "Oh, Tony, what have you done to yourself this time?"

Steve, for all his adaptation to the twenty-first century, could be such a goddamned Luddite at times.

"Nothing," Tony snapped, "I've improved. I'm better now: no artificial heart, no more liver problems. I can probably give Wolverine a run for his money when it comes to healing, too." Steve didn't comment, so he added, "This is the faster, stronger, smarter Tony Stark."

"I liked you fine the way you were before," Steve said mulishly.

"I can talk to computers with my brain!" Tony told him, though he knew that probably wouldn't be a selling point. It wasn't, so he stepped forward and put his arms around Steve's neck, whispering into his ear, "You won't believe what it's done for my stamina." He deliberately made a little circle with his hips, pushing them into Steve's.

"I... ah..." Steve stammered, taken off guard.

Before he could back away, Tony hopped up and wrapped up his legs around Steve's waist. "Want to take the new me for a test drive?" he asked, kissing Steve briefly.

Steve frowned. "I'm not sure that's a good idea," he said. "Are you sure you've been checked out?"

"Oh, come on," Tony groaned. "Sal Kennedy, Reed Richards and Hank McCoy have been over every inch of me three times. I'm fine." He loosened his legs enough to slide down over Steve's hips, and grinned at what he found. "Besides, you seem pretty interested to me." He nipped the side of Steve's neck, leaving a red mark.

Steve wavered, then broke. He grabbed Tony's ass, pulling him up then burying his hand in Tony's hair and pulling him in for a deeper kiss. Their teeth bumped before he got the angle right, but then Steve stuck his tongue in Tony's mouth and Tony sucked on it, and everything clicked.

Tony tightened his legs so that he could get his arms free without falling off and tried to pull Steve's hoodie over his head. The resulting tangle of arms almost got him dropped, and he realised that pants just _weren't_ going to work. "Just a sec," he said, and hopped down. He managed to sacrifice only a few buttons shedding his shirt and jeans.

"Now," he said, when they were both naked. "Where were we?"

"Right about here," Steve answered. Tony wasn't a lot shorter, or a lot lighter, but Steve had no trouble picking him up and shoving him against the penthouse wall. They kissed furiously, no longer caring about teeth or bitten lips and tongues. Tony curled an arm around Steve's neck and ran his other hand up and down Steve's back as though he was trying to memorise the contours of his muscles. Steve kneaded Tony's ass in response.

This position was way better, Tony decided, when they didn't have any pesky layers of clothing between their dicks. He shimmed as best he could, pressed between Steve's bulk and the wall, and Steve moaned encouragingly.

Steve's fingers had moved down into the crack of his ass, rubbing over his hole. Then they faltered, causing Tony to stop kissing Steve and demand, "Don't stop now!"

"No lube," Steve explained.

Tony opened the hand behind Steve's neck, dropping a bottle and catching at waist level, before pressing it into Steve's hand. "Way ahead of you, Cap," he said, smirking.

"Condoms?"

Tony sighed. "We both have superhuman immune systems..." he started, but Steve's look told him that this wasn't a good time to push that boundary. "Okay, fine." He dropped a little foil package too. Steve picked it out of the air, left handed and behind his back, before Tony could snatch it away again.

All the rubbing and wiggling Tony was doing must have had some effect on Steve, because he only spent half the time he usually did stretching Tony out before spreading Tony's legs and entering him. Maybe he believed Tony about the enhancements after all.

Tony's head cracked against the wall when he threw it back, and he swore. One profanity stretched into another and disintegrated into a babble of praise and imprecations as Steve drove into him like a piston engine.

Every thrust slammed Tony up into the wall, knocking the air from his lungs, and the drops between them left him feeling like he'd abandoned his stomach somewhere above. If he didn't have cybernetically-enhanced lungs, he probably would have passed out by now.

His own cock was trapped against his belly, but the shift of their bodies provided enough friction that he didn't mind that Steve seemed far more interested in his ass. When Steve pushed a finger into him beside his cock, jamming it right against his prostate, Tony screamed and came harder than he had in fifteen years. He dug his short nails into Steve's back and held on until the shudders passed.

"I thought you said you had increased stamina," Steve said smugly, and then started moving again.

"Oh, fuck off," Tony muttered into his neck. He wrapped his arms around Steve's shoulders and slumped against him. He could feel his own, real, mostly-flesh-and-blood heart pounding against Steve's chest, and Steve still moving inside him.

Life was pretty damned good right now.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [O Thou Bleak and Unbearable World (The Looking to the Sky to Save Me Remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6041211) by [Sineala](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sineala/pseuds/Sineala)




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